Killing It by Asia Mackay is a gripping and compelling thriller that captures the experiences of working mothers in an exciting and thrilling adventure. Following Alexis Tyler, a working mum and secret agent in Her Majesty's Secret Service, we join her as she returns from maternity leave for a high stakes mission. Throughout this fast-paced, high-stakes journey we see her determination to be both an elite agent and mother, navigating her roles as a secret agent and parent with immense resilience and poise. An action-packed, thrilling novel that ultimately celebrates the power of motherhood and working women alike.

With thanks to netgalley and the author for giving me the chance to review this book.

Killing was a great book with some good characters. An easy but good read,

Unfortunately this book was not for me, it was a bit slower than I would like and it just didn't hold my attention. I am sure other people will love it!

An absolutely brilliant concept! Thoroughly enjoyed this book, Loved the main character a ballsy new mum! With a mystery at its heart but full of humour. Cannot wait to read ‘The Nursery ‘

This is a light, addictive read with excellent character construction and good dialogue.

Lex, I love you.

Lex is my new hero - she's juggling it all and managing just brilliantly! I raced through it, and loved the dark humour and great characters. Such a refreshing take on the spy/crime/thriller genre: who needs James Bond when you have Lex Tyler?

Asia Mackay really hit it out of the park with Killing It, and it is like Killing Eve which I just started watching. Definitely going to buy a physical copy of this and Asia Mackay just might become an insta-buy author for me. Absolutely loved it!

Great book; great storyline; great characters; great read. What more can you say? A refreshingly good book and one that kept me reading.

This book is brilliant, the story moves along at a fast, perfect clip.
Asia Mackay makes the character of Lex believable, clearly drawing on her own experience of motherhood and London. It does lead me to worry about where she gained the information for the secret agent and hired assassin component but I digress.
The humour of a new mum coming back to work, juggling secrets, even from her husband, the importance of socialising with like minded individuals, though not all have bullet proof prams, international pressure from the Russians, 'Killing it' has it all.

What a line to open a book with: 'I pull my pistol out of my striped Cath Kidston nappy bag.' I was intrigued, at the same time hoping this was not going to be a rather clichéd, cheesy attempt at portraying a kick-arse heroine. It only took another couple of paragraphs to realise that, on the contrary, it was going to turn out to be rather engaging.

Going back to work after maternity leave isn't unusual. Thousands, millions even, of women do it. But, Alexis Tyler is mum to rosy-cheeked, squiggy-cheeked, all-round scrummy little Gigi…in one life. In her other, secret, unbeknownst-to-husband-Will life, she's a highly trained secret agent, risking her life for queen and country, killing whoever needs to be eliminated in the interests of national security. And day one back on job means being thrown right back in at the deep end with a dangerous assignment. That's absolutely fine as long as she can get home to say nighty night to her most treasured possession.

Despite the element of domesticity this was a thriller and a half: fast-paced, gripping, compelling. At the heart of it, is Alexis: dedicated to her job, the best at what she does, fiercely protective of those she loves and vehemently dismissive of the words 'can't' and 'no'.

I really should knock off a star for the rather slack editing, but I really enjoyed the book. It was very evident that the author is a mother and infused the necessary credibility to the work-family tug-of-war Alexis faced. The ending is cheekily tantalising, which means I'll certainly be reading the next Alexis Tyler book.

Killing It by Asia Mackay is an easy, fun and highly entertaining read featuring Alexis Tyler - a working mum with a difference. An elite covert agent for Her Majesty's Secret Service who is struggling to cope with motherhood having just returned to work after her maternity leave.

I felt like a more light hearted read so reached for this book. At first I thought it was going to be just a little too fluffly for my liking as trained killer Alexis reached for her gun and a half eaten rice cake was stuck to the barrel.

The book then went through the usual back to work hang ups any new Mother experiences, together with the male colleagues who just don't get it, and it seemed like any other yummy mummy novel. However, Alexis begins to pepper the narrative with insights from her working life for The Platform part of the Secret Service; such as what a signal failure on the tube really means!

Her first assignment back at work involves getting information from the wife of a rich Russian. As Alexis has a baby now it is decided she has the ultimate cover story to infiltrate the circle of Mothers the lady hangs out with. Weren't they going to let her out in the "real field" anymore I wondered, was this going to be extent of her spying from now on, after having experienced some very high level maneuvers in the past.

The book then quite quickly became more Jane Bond than yummy Mummy and I seriously began to feel a little scared at what Alexis was doing working as a spy. The novel really became a thriller with the fact that Alexis was also a Mummy - so she had the worry of what might happen to baby Gigi if the bad guys caught up with her.

With a lot of humour throughout and most of it relate-able to any female in the workplace let alone a Mummy this was a great tale. Really gripping edge of the seat stuff towards the end of the book felt more like a Jason Bourne novel and certainly not chick lit.

I'm giving this book 5 out of 5 stars and my thanks go to Netgalley for the ARC to review.

Absolutely loved this - incredibly witty, action packed romp through a new mothers return to work following maternity leave.

Thoroughly recommend.

This book was a revelation and a perfect blend of funny and so true moments about motherhood. I really enjoyed the combination of spy thriller and the universal case of mummy guilt. I couldn't stop reading and can't wait for the second title to be published.

Killing it is an amusing satirical thriller about a wife and mother of a baby girl. who secretly works as a government spy and killer. A debut novel, it is cleverly plotted and filled with humour.

Alexis (Lexy) is like most working mothers with a child, struggling to juggle work and family time but unlike every other mother she is a government assassin!!

What a brilliant eye catching beginning;
“I pull my pistol out of my Cath Kidston nappy bag”
From that moment on you had me 100% hooked!!

It is hard enough going back to work, especially when you work in a very male environment and you have to prove that you are still up to the job after having a baby.

Absolutely loved this book and it made me laugh out loud several times, breast pads especially!! Definitely made me think that women can do anything they put their minds to. Please please write a follow up as I just love Lexy and her adorable child Gigi and it would be wonderful to have her working other cases!!

Would make a superb series on the television. Definitely makes a change having a strong kick ass female character!!

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy in exchange for a review.

Full review to come.
I deeply apologize, but life is a handful lately and I'm using all my free time to read, not review. I hope everybody understands.

A different book than I have read before but quite enjoyable. A bit difficult to believe sometimes but I stuck with it and enjoyed eventually.

Lex Tyler is back at work after maternity leave and has to face the usual battles. You know the drill, sexism, people accusing you of baby brain, backstabbing....although in this case literal backstabbing and shootings. You see Lex isn't the data processor she tells her family she is. She's a bona fide government-sponsored assassin. And not only is she one of the best she really enjoys her job. But be a deadly secret agent and breastfeeding is a tricky juggling act especially if your fellow agents aren't exactly supportive. But she's determined to make it work, even if it kills her.

This has to be one of the funniest books I've read this year. At times it does lull a bit but ultimately Lex is a great character so even the lulls are very enjoyable. In the end, I sensed a follow-up...I hope I'm right!

I have to preface this review with the fact that I am not a mother, nor do I currently have any plans to have kids in the foreseeable future, it's not something I find myself wanting. And this book was certainly not written with me in mind. I don't mean that in a bad way, and you can't argue that you don't know what you're getting yourself in for from the beginning, but I do think that there are other people who would get more out of this book than I would. 

This book is fun, that was my biggest takeaway. It doesn't shy away from the violence and the danger but it is fun at the core. It's so silly at times that you have to laugh out loud, the moment we got onto bulletproof pram covers I got the sense of what this book was trying to do. Conceptually, I think it's a clever idea for a story and, while it definitely goes to the extreme, it knows what it's doing. 

But if you are the kind of person who inhabits that 'mum' world, I can only assume that this will resonate even more powerfully with you. Either you'll relate to the Cath Kidston references or you'll read it as an amusing caricature of parenthood. I don't doubt that there were a lot of 'in-jokes' that I missed, I'm sure someone else would be able to find them.

I did have a good time reading this, I thought that the pacing was right, there was just the right balance between action and downtime. The plot itself had that 'plausible but still ridiculous' feel of old spy novels, there are twists and turns aplenty. This is a book to be read on the go, you can see it clutched on buses, planes, trains etc. 

Should you read this? If it seems like something you would find fun then I say go for it, you'll certainly find it entertaining! 

My rating: 3/5 stars

I received a free digital review copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.